Anthology - Dark Whispers Part 19

"Does what?" I asked.

"Misses her."

I stopped, held Rick back with my arm. "Can we, uh...can we do something about Sam, like put him back or something."

"Shee-it, Matt! No!"

"Well, I just thought that maybea"

"What? We could put him back, bury him, say a few words and all would be right?"

"Yeah, why not?"

"Because, Matt, my boy, it doesn't work that way. Trust me."

"What can I do then?" I asked.

"I don't know. I guess your going to have to live with it."

POP WAS YELLING, "STUPIDMUTTf.u.c.k!GONNAKICKYERBONEYa.s.sa" BACKTOh.e.l.l!"

I ran pell-mell down the stairs in time to witness Pop's drunken kick connect to Sam's chest. The force of the blow shot Sam across the room, where he landed in a heap. Sam looked up at Pop with the same disinterested gaze, resuming his p.r.o.ne position, head down, resting on his legs.

Pop staggered forward screaming, "G.o.dd.a.m.nm.u.t.h.a!!!", lashing out again with his size thirteen, sending Sam sailing through the air to thump against the wall. Sam slid down, like a s...o...b..ll on a door, trailing yellow slime.

I ran across the room, leaping headlong at Pop, who was again ambling forward, a sinister sneer plastered to his face.

I hit him on the run, knocking him sideways into the china cabinet. He pushed himself up onto his arms and I threw a haymaker, hitting him squarely on the chin and sending him flat. He lay still, breath rasping.

Walking over to Sam, I bent down to check his wounds. There were none. Sam sat pa.s.sively as I checked every bit of his unkempt fur for any sign of a cut or abrasion. Nothing.

When I went to check Pop, he was sitting upright, leaning back on the over-turned cabinet. "Sorry Pop, I don't know what got into me."

"S'okay, son. S'okay."

THE SAM-THING just lay there, all day, all night. It lay there and did nothing. It didn't move, didn't yelp, didn't eat. It didn't even s.h.i.t. It slumped beside the easy-chair and stayed.

The smell from the house was putrefying; a stench of whiskey and death. I stayed away as often as I could, coming home to eat a bologna sandwich and to sleep.

Sleep was difficult. Strange dreams disturbed my slumber. In one vivid dream, Sam was in Pop's room, straddling Pop's chest and lapping at it with an eager tongue. Pop's chest had been torn open and I could see his pulsing heart. Then the Sam-thing turned my way and spoke in Rick's voice, it's jaws moving like a badly translated G.o.dzilla movie, "See, Matt, it's just as I said."

I awoke with a start, shivering uncontrollably.

Please, dear G.o.d, let it be over.

I CREPT OUT of bed, determined to end the sufferinga"Pop's, mine, and Sam's.

As I pa.s.sed by Pop's door, I peeked in. He was in bed, dead to the world.

I paused at the top of the stairs, knees buckling, then hardened my resolve and slipped quietly down the stairs.

Sama"the Sam-thinga"was still by the chair. His head came round slowly, watching as I went to the front closet.

I rooted around *til I found the Louisville Slugger.

I was crying now, tears like lava streaming down my face. My heart was pounding, trying to escape its cage, and the blood-rush roared in my ears.

I stumbled across the room, to where Sama"the Sam-thinga"lay.

As I lifted the baseball bat, the Sam-thing's eyes locked on mine. I faltered.Was there something there? A certain look? A hint of intelligence?

I looked again, more closely. Two dead, vacant eyes regarded me, unconcerned.

I lifted the bat again and swung. It connected with a dull thud. I closed my eyes, swung again. Thwump. And again. Thwump. Again. Thwump. Thwump. Tears coursed down my face, breaking free of my shut lids.

Thwump thwump thwump thwump thwump.

I raised and lowered the Louisville countless times, until the thudding sound receded to a mushy, pulpy sound. Then I vomited.

There was a knock at the door. My heart nearly burst from my chest.

BOOM BOOM BOOM!.

"Come on, Matt, it's me, Rick. Open up."

I walked numbly over to the door, dragging the baseball bat like dead weight, and pulled it open.

Rick stared at me, his mouth forming an O of surprise. "I...um, I brought y-you something. For you and your Pop." He stepped to one side.

The Mom-thing stood there.

I raised the bat.

Moving Pictures...Still Lifeby Stephen M. Rainey Stephen M. Rainey is best known as the man behind the 10 year publication of one of the most popular magazines in horror, "Deathrealm," which unfortunately ceased publication in September 1997. Other landmarks include over 70 published short stories, having appeared in such places as, "Love in Vein II," "100 Vicious Little Vampire Stories," "100 Wicked Little Witch Stories," "Robert Bloch's Psychos," and has a story forthcoming in Whitley Strieber's HWA anthology, "Aliens."

"Good to SEE you!"

"I've been DYING to see you!"

"Those who hide are AFRAID!"

a"THE PRISONER SHE HAD DONE it for the money. Because she wanted to be a model. Because it signified her independence, her own free will. Because she wanted to escape her parents' authority, the bonds of their religion. Because shecould .

But now, bright, lurid hard copy, shouting to the world, "This is what I am!" between the covers of some filthy rag, to be e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed upon by pathetic, lonely perverts. Her face, separated into four colors and reconst.i.tuted, her grimace one of ecstasy as that huge... thing... penetrated her, pumping in and out, fiercer, harder.

Jack me *til I scream...

The music: heavy, palpitating rhythm, a counterpoint to her pounding heart. The smell: musk and sweet perfume, smoke from somebody's cigarette. The touch: hot and sweaty, like pieces of seared meat, bleeding. Hands that ran up and down her body, questing, stroking, sliding over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, between her legs, squeezing her b.u.t.tocks. Fingers tickling, probing...then stabbing.

She was only sixteen.

She threw the magazine on the floor, and fell onto her bed as hot tears turned the sunlight streaming through the window to faceted crystals, multiplying the magazine image many times: an insect's-eye view. Staring into the empty light outside, she whispered, "I only wanted to be a model."

She stood five-foot-seven, weighed one-ten, the faintest tan tinting her unblemished skin. Long, chestnut hair fell in waves around her softly-sculpted face. Wide, blue eyes with hazel rims that someone claimed made her look exotic. Sweet, pouting lips beneath a small, finely-angled nose. The face of an angel, the body of a G.o.ddess. At nine years old, she'd been told by everyone, "You should be a model! You're a natural!" At eleven, they wouldn't even let her into the movie theaters at kid's prices.(What the h.e.l.l are you trying to pull, sweetheart?) She could buy beer now if she wanted to, and they wouldn't card her.

When they'd told her what she had to do, she'd actually been exciteda"thrilled.My G.o.d, it's for real! she thought, but never quite sure she believed it. Even when Billy Moon stuck that rod into her, even when she tasted his breath, then his d.i.c.k in her mouth, she wasn't sure she believed it. All the while, the clicks of cameras, hot studio lights burning like suns around them. The cloying perfume that filled the air seemed to intoxicate her, excite a forbidden pa.s.sion. When Billy Moon came in her mouth, she swallowed it all, greedily, all the while thinking, "I'm not Mom and Dad's little girl anymore. I'm me. I'M ME!"

But even then, so unreal. Never sure it wasn't just a dream, not even a bad dream, just something that had happened. They'd given her five-hundred dollars. In cash. All those bills were still stuffed under her mattress, unspent. She could never explain that money to her parents.

Her own face gazed seductively from the magazine. Yeah, it had been real. Every filthy, stinking moment of it, real as the pain of going to the bathroom for the next week. He'd d.a.m.n near split her open. All because she'd wanted to be a model.

In the photo, her legs were spread, the camera lens capturing her s.e.x close up as it was violated by that huge, swollen member. The next photo, that same organ filled her mouth, her eyes closed in something resembling pure joy. In the next, she was getting it up her a.s.s, her back arched as Billy Moon pumped away, inexhaustible.

"That's not modeling," she whispered to her photograph. "That isn't me."

Five hundred dollars offered to a naive sixteen-year-old. My G.o.d, how many peoplea"voyeursa"would see her? Who might recognize her? Surely, no one she knew. No one in this town would buy such trash. Youcouldn't buy it in this town. But New York was only an hour away. Did some of the lily-white church members here once a week or once a month get into their cars, and go sample the wares in that mammoth cesspool, this time to come home with a pleasant surprisea"their own Rachel Van Horne, laid out in an eight-page full-color spread, racked in throes of ecstasy as she took Billy Moon into every orifice of her body?

In the other room, the phone rang.

"YOU SHOULD BE in the movies."

"What?"

"You're magnificent.You need to be seen live, in action. Still photos just don't do you justice."

Terror scuttled down her backbone.Someone knew! "Who is this?" she asked, keeping her voice low. Ten feet away, her father sat in his favorite chair watching Reverend D. James Kennedy talk about how the universe itself was the greatest proof of all that G.o.d existed. Her voice must not betray her. "You have the wrong number."

The man on the other end seemed to purr like a cat. His voice was whispery, rhythmic. Maybe he was beating off as he spoke to her. "You're so beautiful. I've never seen anything like you. You've gotta make movies. Get with me, I want to film you."

"How do you know who I am?" she asked, too late realizing how wrong it was to engage this man in conversation. Her dad glanced back at her, face impa.s.sive, probably thinking she was gabbing with one of her usual group of friends.

But the voice didn't let up. It seemed so distant, almost as if it belonged to a ghost, intent on luring her to the other side. "I have to have you, Rachel. I want to see you whenever I want to. You have to make movies. I will film you."

"I gotta go," she said softly, starting to hang up the phone. But something held her, some mesmerizing power from the speaker. Before placing the receiver back in the cradle, she heard deep, hollow sighs, and a last, "Please...do it."

"Who was that, honey?" her dad called back to her.

"Some guy from school wanting me to go out with him," she said, a little too quickly. "I told him no."

"Not that David Rosenman, was it? He's bad news, sweetheart."

"No, no," she breathed, thoughts whirling almost out of control. She had to keep cool. "This guy named Billy. I don't even like him very much."

Her dad nodded and returned to his viewing, blessedly releasing her from his scrutiny. She went back to her room and closed the door, sprawling on her bed again, thanking G.o.d he hadn't noticed her eyes were red.

She was sixteen. They expected her to have a sixteen-year-old's problems. Boysa"goodboys. Schoolwork. They wanted her to be the youth leader at Church. Jenny and Sara had made the cheerleading squad, and her parents wouldn't even let her try out: it was depraved, unG.o.dly. She would not flaunt her body in a tight sweater and short skirt in front of the whole school, prompting every young wh.o.r.e-monger in the audience to drool l.u.s.tfully after her.

No, that was unthinkable.

"GOOD TO SEE you."

He'd been so nice, so well-dressed, soa"beautiful! Clear, intelligent eyes, thick black hair, parted neatly on one side. A distinguished profile, with firm jaw and aquiline nose. But a gentle mouth, one that spoke no lies. She'd answered the ad from the modeling agency in the paper, met him on a Sat.u.r.day, telling her parents she was going to the shopping mall for a haircut. She'd gotten a haircut, all righta"and a small advance for her first job. He had an office rented out on East Main, where the sporting goods store used to be. A darkroom in back. Plenty of photographic equipment, everything proper and above-board.

"You can model for us, no problem," he'd told her, appraising her with professional detachment. "I'm sure we can put together a portfolio that'll interest some of our biggest clients. I guarantee you that at least one of our New York accounts will want to meet you personally before two weeks are up. We handle just about all the big magazinesa"Elle, Cosmo, Seventeen, Selfa"I imagine you'll be a hot property."

"How long does it take to really make it big time?" she asked, her eyes widening with excitement. "Weeks? Months?"

His smile, so dazzling. "With you, Rachel, not long at all. Now, we have some other possibilities I'd like to discuss with you. They involve a lot of money. I have to warn youa"some of the things I'll ask you will be very personal. You don't have to answer if you don't want toa"I'll completely understand. But the more open you are with me, the better your chances are. Does that sound fair?"

"Very fair!" she said, answering his sweet smile with one of her own, barely able to contain her excitement.

SHE'D HAD HERSELF tested immediately after the shoot. She'd have to go back againa"and again. No HIV, no AIDS. So far. This time. Christ, in that one afternoon, she had opened herself up to every kind of corruption, both of the flesh and of the spirit. What did it matter if she survived now? She had become unclean.

An abomination.

That's what G.o.d called people like her. Abominations. Worthless, h.e.l.l-bent souls beyond hope of any redemption. Given over to sin. And the wages of sin was death. She heard it every Sunday.

"I'M ME!"

But G.o.d didn't care. G.o.d only cared that you believed in Jesus, and did everything straight and didn't give in to temptation. He didn't care if you had a life, and wants and needs and desires, all He wanted was your soul, full-time, no vacations. Like her parents. If G.o.d was anything like her parents, she wanted no part of Him.

She turned on her little black and white television, saw some old British program that was so weird: it had this big, white balloon-thing that chased after people, enveloping them and taking them away. This one guy was always running from it, always getting caught. Always coming so close to escaping but never quite succeeding. She could almost relate to how that man must feel, trapped in some puny, artificial world, where everyone was an automaton, smiling phony, and you couldn't get away, you just couldn't.

He was in some large, bizarre-looking room, while another man sat in a spherical chair in the middle of the room.

"Good to see you...I've been dying to see you..."

"Get away," she whispered to the television set. "Get the h.e.l.l away from there. Don't play their game."

A knock at the door. She switched off the show, because Mom and Dad didn't like her to watch those things. Bad influence. Like she didn't have a stereo because she might play something that would insult G.o.d. She made sure the magazine was out of sight.

"Come in."

Her mom. Tall and erect, once as pretty as Rachel herself, now a stern, handsome woman whose soul hid beneath crosses, white doves and holy communions. Mrs. Van Horne taught Sunday School, sang in the choir, witnessed to the unchurched at the shopping mall on Wednesdays, and took the good news to shut-ins and the hospitalized three days a week:"Repent now, accept Jesus as your personal savior, or you'll spend the rest of eternity suffering in h.e.l.l. Praise Jesus for his love and mercy!"